Nate Byrnes - Good Brew Hunting: Green beer can be a very good thing

Many of us have been unfortunate enough to try a green beer on Saint Patrick's Day, but why dye a beer green when you can make it truly green by drinking something more sustainable? Read on to find out more about how to make your St. Paddy's Day beer even greener than the meadows of Ireland.

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By Nate Byrnes

southcoasttoday.com

By Nate Byrnes

Posted Mar. 13, 2014 at 12:01 AM

By Nate Byrnes
Posted Mar. 13, 2014 at 12:01 AM

» Social News

Many of us have been unfortunate enough to try a green beer on Saint Patrick's Day, but why dye a beer green when you can make it truly green by drinking something more sustainable? Read on to find out more about how to make your St. Paddy's Day beer even greener than the meadows of Ireland.

No matter how rich your stout is, no matter how many hops are in your IPA, beer is still 85 to 95 percent water, which weighs over 8 pounds per gallon. Oh, and beer's packaging doubles that weight, so takes quite a bit of fuel to ship all that Guinness just over 3,000 miles from Dublin.

Don't think I'm just picking on imports. The fantastic Stone Arrogant Bastard travels nearly as far as your Guinness from outside San Diego (around 2,700 miles) to quench your thirst. So no matter how green the brewery may be, and many are incredibly green, transporting beer long distances negates a lot of the good done by the brewery's sustainable practices.

Plus, transporting beer is one of the best ways to ruin your brew. Light and heat wreck beer by breaking down hop acids to make skunky beer and through oxidation to make beer taste like cardboard. The further it travels, the more opportunities for negative impacts and wrecked beer, so not only is long-distance beer less green, it doesn't taste as good!

What's a socially and environmentally responsible beer drinker to do? One of the first and best steps to take is to drink local beer, especially from green-minded brewers.

Thankfully for us, all three of the nearest breweries have excellent environmental policies — Buzzards Bay claims to be "America's Greenest Brewery" through a variety of initiatives, including being a "no waste" brewery, where all their waste gets reused. In addition, Berkley Brewing uses waste wood to heat their water, and Goodfellows may be the only brewery in the region to use hops grown on-site.

To get so green your friends might think you're the Jolly Green Giant, try growling. Growlers are half-gallon refillable containers that can be brought to local breweries like Buzzards Bay, Mayflower, and Cape Cod Brewing. Refills are usually cheaper than buying bottles, after an initial deposit for the container. Heck, Buzzards Bay offers a 10-pack of growler tickets for $60. Seeing that a growler provides over 5 bottles of beer, that's just a bit over a dollar a beer.

Growlers harken back to the more sustainable days of yore. Pre-Prohibition and for a while after prohibition, nearly all beer was sold in refillable containers. Your parents and grandparents would go down to the local tavern or restaurant to refill containers of beer. Cans and bottles were almost non-existent until soldiers, whose deployment had brought about the popularity of canned beer, started returning from war.

Draft beer still has approximately 68 percent less environmental impact than bottled beer, according to the Brewers' Association, so growlers (or drinking at your local watering hole) can make a significant difference.

To be clear: Don't feel guilty about drinking an import or a California brew. I love Stone and Sierra Nevada's brews and quite a few offerings from their West Coast brew brothers. Just think twice before you make your beer choices. The planet, and your fellow humans, will appreciate it.

Start your Massachusetts brewery tours with the new Massachusetts Craft Brewers' Passport! There are more than 60 breweries in the program, broken up into five regions. Visit all the breweries in a region for a T-shirt, or finish all five regions for a commemorative glass after visiting all 60. Learn more at http://www.mass.gov/agr/massgrown/culinary_tourism/brewery_tours.htm

Lees' Market is hosting a St. Paddy's Day Tasting from 4:30 to 6:30 tonight. The libations will include Irish beers, ciders, and whiskeys.

Taste of WGBH Spring Brews Event will be held from 6 to 8 p.m March 20. The cost is $25 for members, $35 for non-members. http://www.wgbh.org/foodwine/winterbrew.cfm

The Spring Beer Fest will be held at the Boston Center For the Arts in three sessions on March 23. Tickets are $59, but can be had for $29 at LivingSocial.com (linked from my Facebook page).

The annual NERAX (New England Real Ale exhibition) festival will be held at Aeronaut Brewing Company in Somerville on March 26-29. Admission is $17, or $15 in advance, and beers run from $2 to $6. "Real Ale" is ale that has been cask-conditioned and allowed to naturally ferment. Enthusiasts insist it's far superior and more complex than regular beer.

The eighth annual Great International Spring Beer Festival will be held on April 12 from 1 to 4:30 and 6:30 to 10. There will be more than 250 brews available to sample at the Rhode Island Convention Center. Tickets are $44. http://www.beerfestamerica.com/

All former Good Brew Hunting columns are now available online at www.goodbrewhunting.com. I really appreciate feedback! Hit me with ideas for beers, events, or breweries at www.facebook.com/GoodBrewHunting or via email at goodbrewhunting@gmail.com.

Nate lives in Westport with his wife, two kids, small farm worth of pets, a basement fridge full of local craft beer, and assortment of bottles/kegs/carboys of homebrew at various states of completion.